UH Manoa Campus Events Calendar

The Murder of Tiberius Gracchus

"The Priests, the Goddess, and the Murder of Tiberius Gracchus: Roman Ritual on Foreign Soil" a lecture by Dr. John Dillon, University of Peking

The spectacular murder of the tribune Tiberius Gracchus in 133 B.C. shook the Roman Republic. It may even have troubled the gods: according to Cicero, after the report of omens, a delegation of Roman priests set out to appease the goddess Ceres in her Sicilian sanctuary at Enna. This unusual event in the history of Roman religion is frequently interpreted in light of Roman politics. The study of Roman conceptions of religious territory, however, and an appreciation of Cicero's misleading version of the events suggest a different explanation, one less political but religiously no less exceptional.